I started out as a lighting guy. But I saw the writing on the wall early on, and with the aid of my mind’s eye, I drifted into a video guy. I guess in some sense I’ll always be a lighting guy — can’t have video without lighting, right?
I didn’t earn my Honorary Video Merit Badge until much later in my career. I came up like a lot of folks in the business, schlepping gear for various bands and companies. I learned along the way and had some great teachers (whether they knew it or not). As the employment numbers will tell you, a skill learned “on-the-job” may not be the path that most choose, but it will be vitally important in the coming years. I read a report that many so-called “company towns” are in trouble right now because they have to either hire from outside or promote from within. And with the latter being evermore challenging in fields like robotics, engineering, and science, the former is actually very popular in today’s current climate.
So I consider myself lucky that I had the wherewithal to constantly learn and constantly strive to advance (at whatever pace was comfortable at the time). Along the way, there were times when I just cruised along. I had a decent gig and did what was required (and usually a little more) and that was that. But there were other moments when I actually realized that I was at a turning point. They were moments in time when I knew that something was changing and I was going down a different path. These are moments I can recall with vivid accuracy.
I had a dream the other night where I recalled many of these moments (and no, it did not include the latest Sports Illustrated issue with Kate Upton). It was weird, though — I was kind of an apparition, not unlike Scrooge’s tormentors, and I was peering down onto myself at various stages of my career.
Cue Dream Sequence
From a little way up I peer down on my twenty-something-year-old-self…
I am schlepping some cable from a smallish “production” company to a much larger one that cross-rented it from us. I am not real sure what to do other than “drop this load at their shop, and don’t be late!” I, of course, am driving my own truck, because said smallish company doesn’t actually own any trucks. So I go in the sleek office of the really big lighting company and tell them I have some cable for them. I don’t even know what kind of cable it is. The nice office lady tells me to wait and I see an intense looking guy poring over some papers at the front.
I fly over and nudge the kid…
“Pardon me, but do you guys hire freelance technicians?”
The guy looks at me, his eyes narrow slightly, and he says, “Yeah. I hire freelance. Can you be here tomorrow morning ready to work?”
“Absolutely.” And I land my first gig in La-La Land. I did a bunch of work for them until a real fateful one. It was one of those crazy-long gigs that went waayy over when it should have, and somehow it was myself and the crew chief left after something like 22 hours. I stuck it out, and the guy doubled my pay and made sure I got an invite to the Christmas party. At the party I’m re-introduced to the guy from the front office — the owner, actually — and he shakes my hand for a job well done. I ended up cutting my teeth on 60K up-and-down festival rigs and early versions of intelligent lights with them for four years.
I’m hovering over an open pit in the middle of Manhattan and there is a huge mud hole forming as hundreds of people are below street level trying to erect a stage, tent, and ribbon-cutting ceremony. People are running, slipping, swearing; there are bullhorns at ear-piercing levels; police lights. I gravitate to the young man and give a little bump…
My young self goes to the guy who looks and acts like he’s in charge and says, “Are you Mac?”
The surly crew chief, who is clearly not happy, looks down and barks:
“Are you Gooch?”
“Yes sir.”
“Do you know anything about electricity, Mr. Gooch?”
“Enough to stay alive,” I manage.
“Good. Because you’re going to learn a lot more today!” And, with that, I work 18 hours straight, dragging feeder through mud and wrapping the connections in gaff tape and plastic. I work three more years for that company and learn more about lighting and electricity than I’ve ever learned
anywhere.
I’m floating in a ballroom in D.C. and there is a small rig of truss, cans, and lekos around a stage. There are video screens, teleprompters, cameras, and projectors. Strange gear from the weird, younger, much-higher-tech-and-more-expensive sibling of our business. Video gear. The polished, more sophisticated cousin of what we do. The young crew is literally bristling with gusto and panache. They are all sh*t-sure and confident. I am nothing here. I am no one…
I, of course, set all the truss and lights up (because I’m the truss monkey) so I had some extra time. The rig was sitting at what I considered to be acceptable show level. This assessment was mainly from what I had learned from the rock ‘n’ roll guys and what I had gleaned from the years I had in the Biz. So now the vidiots could do what they knew to do.
At this point in the dream, my younger (now slightly older) self is puttering around behind the curtains, consolidating gear, cases, and other crap so the load out can go quickly (because that’s what you should do)…But I notice a guy hunched over some strange monitors in video village, twisting knobs and pushing buttons. I fly over and give the kid a nudge…
“What exactly are you doing?” my young self asks.
“Timing the cameras. Since this is what you guys said was show level, I need to make sure the cameras see what true white and true black are, so all the colors in between come out right.”
I stare for a few brief moments, and then something hits me like a baseball bat. Wham! Everything I have done in the past 10 years makes sense. I had learned to focus lights on people, stuff, cars, and products using my eyes, and here was this guy showing me what that actually meant, and it was an epiphany. It was like I had learned to play piano by feel and then someone explained the math of twelve-tone theory and 188 keys. I was awestruck.
I hover back to see my body on a wide-open bed.
From that fortunate lesson with a waveform/vectorscope, I learned that a little L202 on the upstage truss wash could make a scene come alive and make everyone look 10 years younger (especially in front of a silver or white background). I learned that Rosco ND#210 in the downstage rig would reduce the available light by two full stops and make it so I could run my 1000W (now ancient) PAR can rig at 80 percent and still have enough headroom to bump up the lights without freaking out the video folks.
Whether you gravitate to the video or lighting side of things, lighting knowledge is of paramount importance. It’s the basis of everything we do.
